skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Taken by Alex, we were at the hotel grounds and this dog was tied to a table. It was very VERY nervous as two donkeys were around, so bad that its eyebrows kept twitching quite hilariously. So i went to sit with it and pet it abit.
There were many horses at that hotel, took a close up of this pretty one :)
Mother and child, i had to show the pic where her face was funnier.
ROFL? XD This one was rolling abit, managed to get it as it rolled XD
Now who said horses never laid down?
This donkey is pregnant :D
Aint this bird so sweet and cute?
Think again. You can probably see its face better if you click on the pic and zoom in. Priceless.
Swallow nest found under the roof of the hotel, with a few others nearby and marks that showed many nests had been built in the same areas before.
We stopped by this waterfall on our roadtrip :)
It continued to a powerful gushing river...
And that's an attempt to capture the power of the water,at least in my terms XD
This is Troll Mountain, something you'd think would fit the LOTR world quite nicely. Troll Wall (the part above) is the tallest vertical rock face in Europe, 1100 meters from the base to the summit at its tallest. Further research on this said that the series of spires and pinnacles formed along the summit rim of the mountain are what gave rise to it being called the Troll Mountain. "Legend varies, but possibly the trolls that once inhabited this coastal mountain region (and still part of area's lore), were petrified forever for their sins. Each of the dozen- or-so 300 foot spires has its own name". XD
Flower fly again
a very interesting flower.. A flower with flower prints inside XD.
This Alex had found in his parent's garden. Its a web full of new baby spiders!!
This is a very pretty coloured fly.
and that's all for today!
Alex's parents stayed in Trondheim for a night at a hotel, with a big banner on it claiming that it had Norway's best breakfast. Breakfast ended at 10, and me and alex got there at 9:45am i think. We didnt know it ended at 10, which sucks, because they started clearing food away then.
It was a nice place though, and there was a nice variety of food. There were also chefs to make you a customized omelette or fry your bacon. Didnt really get the chance to check out other stuff. But it was a good breakfast overall, despite not getting more of what i wanted XD
Later we went to Ikea to buy new furniture! :D I had planned to get Alex a new chair since his old was literally falling to bits. Its abit new, trying to go as a group where each person wants to look at something different. But in the end, we managed to find some really nice furniture :D
oh, thats the daim chocolate cake we had (its gooooood). And the pic above it shows why i put on 3kg in norway in a period of a month and a half.
First up, a shelf. It costed 750nkr i think? 700 something at least. While almost completing building it, Alex said there isnt a reason why the shelf cant be placed the way it is above XD ( by 'right', it should be standing nice and tall.) But this way, we get abit more additional surface area because it now doubles as a counter as well! woohoo XD
This chair i got for 349nkr , which is really cheap for that type :D It feels nice to sit on, and was a pain to assemble because the wheels would only fit into the plastic legs at an angle. So its struggle till i get the exact angle to let it slide in. The manual of course just points an arrow where to stick it, with no further details. And till now, i dont understand why its such a struggle despite shining light down it and studying its structure. It looked like a simple straight cyclindrical hole to stick the wheel in. Perhaps i'm worn out.
I also bought a new coffee table, which was very cheap at 179nkr :D it was quite necessary too, since the old table is far too large for our new sofa. I like how there's space for me to chuck my laptop under if we have guests over too :)
Lastly, our sexy black soft leather sofa. X) oh yeah. X). Its actually bought 2nd hand from an acquaintance of Alex. Cute story behind it. Its actually pretty new, but the guy's new girlfriend has something very against black leather sofas, and so he put it up for sale to get a new one XD So Alex managed to get it for about 1500nkr, a great price for this quality of luxurious comfiness.
I shall now continue to rest my ass on my spot of eternal dibs.
This is the Musk Ox. They are an endangered species which almost died out i think, and was reintroduced to several locations like norway and greenland in effort to raise its population. To date, about 80,000 to 125,000 exist.
Musk Ox males are very aggressive during the mating season, which according to wikipedia is in the peak of august, and they would attack even birds that land in their territory. They have huge sharp horns and thick skulls- in combination called the Boss. They are also capable of running 65km/h.
Muskoxen stand 1.2 m (3 ft 11.2 in) high at the shoulder on average, with females measuring 135 to 200 cm (53.1 to 78.7 in) in length, and males 200 to 250 cm (78.7 to 98.4 in). Adults, on average, weigh 285 kg (628 lb) and range from 180 to 400 kg (397 to 882 lb).
There is only one place to find them in Norway, and that is the Dovre mountain range. We stayed a night in a ...hmm, sort of hotel for a night. There were many activities to do there, ranging from horse back riding (lasts 3 hours) to canoeing and going on guided tours to find wild animals like the musk ox and elk. But these activities come at a high price, with horse riding costing about 350nkr and guided tours 435nkr PER PERSON.
A woman told Mary she saw Musk ox while on those horse rides round the mountains, and that it had began to show signs of aggression shortly after she started taking pictures. ( no surprise, they're one huge group of people on horses.) Aggression = lowered head to its knee and stomps.
So the next morning, Robert decided to take us on a drive trip around the mountains ( you pay 50nkr to get in XD ) to look for the Musk ox.
lo behold, it was about 15 minutes or so drive in before we found a small group of 3, but 2 of them went further down the mountain and we lost sight of them. One of them got curious though, i think. It came wandering our way.
now.... warnings on the brochures and by staff was not to get near the musk ox. brochures specifically state to stay 200 meters away at ALL times.
however.... its a rare opportunity to get to see these buggers, so i had to get out of the car and try take better pics. we all did actually. it was at that point perhaps a safe 100 meters away? ;D
it seemed very docile though, i had no worries. i started happily taking pictures, and even with my new 70-300mm zoom lens i was not satisfied. ( i probably would never be unless i was 3 meters from the ox or have those mega zoom lens) so i was mumbling to myself 'come to mama..'. be careful what you wish for, because that ox started walking over slowly while chewing greenery all around.
Robert tried to get us back into the car, obviously with our safety in mind. Tina just goes 'but WHY?' XD. in my defence, i didnt see any signs of aggression. The ox just looked very calm and it couldnt care less.
Anyway, the result was the ox coming 50 meters within range, and we all got to snap happy pics of it while outside the car. Perhaps not knowing how fast these animals can move at that time was ignorant bliss huh?
very sadly though, i didnt manage to get pictures when it was the closest as Mary had borrowed my lens. She's got the better cam though, and i got my own pics.
so there you have it, a refreshing experience that makes me wonder if i should become a wild life photographer XD. Or like aarthi said, i should take pics for national geographic.
i make this because i like to X)
1: A nikon zoom lens that hits 200mm, but more than that is always a bonus. i just googled some random pics XD auto focus always a plus
oh, bf just bought me this today XD a tamron zoom lens that extends up to 300mm! hoorah!! kudos, he didnt even read this post i think
2: a macro lens that will let me take superb pictures of mating bugs to add to my collection of mating organisms. someone has asked me when will i take humans.... hopefully never.
3: a small camera bag that will not only hold my precious, but my accessories like my cleaning cloth, filters and cables! i really like the design of the crumpler bag as it doesnt scream 'LOOK I'M A CAMERA BAG', and it meets my requirements. unfortunately, they dont have this bag in purple (surprise? i actually prefer purple because i'm out in the sun alot when i take pics, and black heats up fast.). morever, the crumpler camera bag is horribly expensive even on ebay.
4: Threadless tees! i'm so in love with these. i can wear them to school and someone *cough* wont say i dress like a bum/slop because the shirts are so cute.
first up, ...forgot the name. bugger!
the night we talked about our dreams...
fail...
running rhino i think XD love this one alot.
went to the island house not too long ago, finally got round to posting pics of what i found there! :D the nicest being the bloodrop moth (direct translation from norwegian). used my new macro filter, which is essentially a magnifying glass that can be screwed on to the camera XD it has its drawbacks, such as having to be quite close to the subject, but i like it anyway.
bloodrop moths are surprisingly easy to take pics of, considering that they fly as slow as bees and they dont care if you go close to them.
went to sit around near bushes and stare into them, and found lots of interesting bugs XD
this spider is building a 'nest' by weaving the leaves shut eventually. how do i know? there's alot of other spiders of the same species already cosy in their leaf homes.
WORMIE!
This worm was immobile. i HAD to poke it with a stick. to my surprise, it remained dead frozen and was hard to poke.
and of course i had to chase butterflies... sadly i couldnt get a macro of a brown butterfly with yellow 'eyes' on its wings. i took a crappy shot with my sony a100 which had the zoom lens, but i'll post the pic later. much later.
fuzzy wuzzy bumble bee XD
and a cool spider...
oh whoops, surprise, more mating bugs from tina!
obviously no privacy. a bee came and NUDGED them away so it could get the flower. interestingly, when the moths mate, one of them will be in a feeding frenzy and go from flower to flower (on the same stalk though) while the other will try keep up while being connected XD and they mate for HOURS. when we left the island house, they were still going at it.
going for a short trip to Rorost, an old norwegian town this weekend and a hotel thats 1000m above sea level in some mountains. cant wait :D
made a beanie for alex back when we were in Hustad. Was surprisingly quick to do (as compared to the first beanie i ever tried to make and till date have only worn it twice perhaps XD). had to rip it all off when it was near completion the first time because i realised it was MUCH too tight due to the cabling pattern. Thankfully, the second attempt was a perfect fit :D
also made a beanie for myself in preparation for winter ( and weird weather in summer, like snow in Hustad a week ago XD). Took two days to make and looks hell messy inside . but its quite a cool beanie and i'll be making one more on my flight.
